The property on which the Parker residence was built formerly belonged to famed Boston painter John Singleton Copley.
In the background is a print of The Death of Major Peirson by John Singleton Copley, depicting the death of a British officer defending Jersey (Millais's family home) during the Battle of Jersey (1781).
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Finding that he had a talent for painting, especially portraiture, Peale studied for a time under John Hesselius and John Singleton Copley.
The artists represented in the collection include Jacopo Sansovino, Pinturicchio, Giorgio Vasari, Lavinia Fontana, Angelica Kauffmann, Ammi Phillips, John Singleton Copley, George Inness, Paul Cezanne, Oskar Kokoschka, Willem deKooning, Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner, Andy Warhol, and Sol LeWitt.
Its lead character Brook Watson was a man notable as the subject of the famous painting Watson and the Shark that he commissioned by John Singleton Copley; it portrayed the event of a shark's attacking him as a youth.
Among the historic objects on display is a tea box, said to be from the same batch that was dumped into Boston Harbor on the night of December 16, 1773 and a very small painting by John Singleton Copley of Isaac Royall, Jr. on copper.
It fuses many influences: the Last Judgment of Michelangelo, the monumental approach to contemporary events by Antoine-Jean Gros, figure groupings by Henry Fuseli, and possibly the painting Watson and the Shark by John Singleton Copley.